


Missing

by Paycheckgurl



Series: Torchwood Bingo 2020 Fics [5]
Category: Doctor Who (2005), Sarah Jane Adventures, Torchwood
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Doctor Who References, Fix It, M/M, Major Character Undeath, Missing, Missing in Action, Mystery, Post-Season/Series 02, Post-Season/Series 03, Sarah Jane adventures references, Timey-Wimey, Torchwood Bingo Fest, Torchwood Bingo Fest 2020
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:35:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 13,138
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26565940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Paycheckgurl/pseuds/Paycheckgurl
Summary: When Ianto goes to bed Jack is there with him. When he wakes up Jack is gone...and so is the universe as Ianto knows it.
Relationships: Gwen Cooper & Ianto Jones, Jack Harkness/Ianto Jones
Series: Torchwood Bingo 2020 Fics [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1897720
Comments: 37
Kudos: 36
Collections: Torchwood Fan Fests: Bingo Fest 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Not beta-Ed because this will be on the longer side and I didn’t want to bother anyone with it due to the (eventual) length. So please feel free to shoot me a comment if you see an obvious grammar slip up. 
> 
> Fills the “Missing” Square on my bingo card.

“Mmm Jack?” 

Ianto called out for his boyfriend sleepily from bed. It wasn’t unusual for Jack to wake up before him when he spent the night; he could usually be found waiting for Ianto in the kitchen. However, Ianto vaguely remembered the feeling of Jack still snuggled against him when he’d stirred a few hours ago, and had expected to wake up to that sensation. Perhaps Jack nestling himself into Ianto neck’s and whispering a half hearted request for morning sex into his ear that would go unfulfilled as they silently chose to simply cuddle close.

The pleasant image was not what Ianto woke up to.

The bed was empty aside from himself. Still in a blurry morning haze, he made an effort to move the blue duvet cover back. 

Ianto stopped for a second. His duvet was supposed to be red. 

Cautiously, he felt for the bedside table lamp, and switched it on. It took but a moment to take in his surroundings: this wasn’t his bed, and this wasn’t his room in his flat. 

Still in his pajama bottoms, he burst into the living area. 

Everything about the flat was wrong. The kitchen and living room were on opposite sides to where they were supposed to be. Ianto’s coffee maker was not the counter where it belonged, and maybe he had bigger problems right now, but that particular fact was very much pissing him off. 

“What the hell?” He called aloud. “Jack?!” 

“Ianto, mate, why are you screaming?” Said a voice. 

A man appeared wearing flannel pajama bottoms. He looked to be about Ianto’s age. His accent was English, although Ianto noticed the shirt he was wearing with the pajama flannels said “WALES” across it, in lettering that invoked the Welsh flag. 

“I’m sorry, I think I’m having a bit of a break down right now. Who are you?” 

The man laughed. “Funny.” 

“No, seriously. Talk to me like I know nothing. Who are you and why am I in this flat?” 

“Your flatmate? Tony? I would hope you’re still here to help me pay off half the rent. Not that the Cardiff Museum pays us enough for it even two ways...”

“Riggggghhhhhttttt. And uh, Tony, have you happened to see a man called Jack Harkness around? Tall. Dark Hair. American Accent. Handsome and unfortunately very aware of that fact?” 

“No?”

Ianto felt himself get up. “FUCK.” 

His mind was screaming  _ do something,  _ although now in a bit of a state he wasn’t sure what something was supposed to be. So perhaps illogically, he went back into his not-bedroom and tried to get dressed. There were no suits to be found in the wardrobe, because of course there weren’t. Instead he settled for a button down and a pair of trousers that could one day be a part of a suit if they found a matching jacket and dreamed hard enough. 

He searched around the bedside table. “Mobile, mobile, where’s the bloody mobile?” 

Finally he spotted a mobile phone plugged in across the room. Already not a great sign as it was different make and model than it was supposed to be. Sleek and modern, he didn’t even have one of these types of smart phones yet. He searched through the contacts. 

There was no Jack. No Harkness, Jack. No Captain Jack Harkness listed. He knew the number. Of course, he knew the number. 

He dialed it. 

“ _ We’re Sorry. The number you have dialed is not in service. Please check the number and dial it again.”  _

“No!” 

He felt him scrolling at quick speeds to the G and C listings. No Gwen. No Gwen Cooper. Cooper, Gwen. He punched in yet another number he knew by heart. 

_ “Hello. You’ve reached Gwen Cooper. I’m not here right now. Please leave a message and I’ll get back to you.”  _

That wasn’t Gwen’s voicemail. Gwen’s voice mail was supposed to be “ _ You’ve reached Gwen Cooper. I’m a bit busy at the moment. If you have this number you can probably guess why. Leave a message.”  _ Ianto was unfortunately very familiar with Gwen’s voicemail as the woman was amazingly adverse to picking up her phone in when he needed her in emergency situations. He had a sinking feeling that she hadn’t simply changed her voicemail message overnight. 

Still he found himself talking after the beep, “Gwen it’s Ianto. Ianto Jones. This is going to sound mad but there’s something gone wrong and just...call me if everything is wrong to you too. I have a feeling that because of...what’s gone wrong I won’t be in your address book, just call this number back.” 

He checked the Js and Ms. No Martha Jones and no Jones, Martha.  _ Idiot,  _ He told himself. Unlike with Gwen and Jack’s, he never bothered to learn Martha’s number the old fashioned way in spite of the fact phone numbers came easy to him. He’d simply programmed it in at the time. 

Desperate he checked for Davidson, Andy, Williams, Rhys, and even Smith, Mickey. Of course they weren’t there. 

Rhiannon’s number was in there. Not that calling his sister would do any good in this situation, but that did serve to confirm this phone was supposed to be, well, his. 

He checked the bedside table one more time in a desperate ploy that maybe his real, actual mobile with the Torchwood team’s numbers programmed in was there. Instead he found a box. A small box. Metal. There was an ornate design on the side. And it glowed an unearthly blue. 

“Well you certainly look like a clue,” he muttered. He pocketed it. It was vaguely, possibly, alien and that was the only thing that was making sense about any of this. And god, maybe that was the hope he needed that he wasn’t completely out of his damn mind. 

There was a wallet with ID that purported to belong to him and some loose cash and coin, which he also pocketed and shoved into the trouser pocket. 

He hadn’t been able to find a set of car keys, or even begin to know where the carpark for the building was, so he instead found himself running out the front door, down the hallway and to the street. He recognized the neighborhood, although it certainly wasn’t his. There was a bus stop and got on. He was going to go to Torchwood and figure this out. 

He got off on his stop and ran along the Plass like a mad man. Until he felt himself physically bump straight into someone. He looked up at who that someone was and it took all of his restraint not to bloody laugh. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter Two fills the Nosy Coworkers Square on my bingo card.

“Andy?” 

Ianto had run right into PC Andy Davidson. 

“Whoa easy there,” said Andy. “Where are you off to in such a hurry?” And then after a pause and a second to register the fact that Ianto had just said his name he added “Wait. Sorry but have we met before?” 

“Andy!” Shouted a very familiar voice. “Captain Smiths wants us patrolling  _ inside _ of the opera building. Keep up!” 

And there in front of him was Gwen Cooper. Only gone was her usual jacket, tight T-shirt and boots. She was back in a copper uniform Ianto had not seen her wear in years. 

He’d moved on from starting dumbly to absolutely feeling frozen. 

She looked at him. “Are you alright, love?” She asked. 

It was Gwen. Sweet and utterly ridiculous and utterly impossible Gwen Cooper. Only it wasn’t. He didn’t see the same kind of seely drive that he’d come to know under her eyes. The specific kind of determination that had been born of dealing with Torchwood’s shit the last few years. And someone that didn’t spend every waking moment with this woman (that she wasn’t spending with Rhys) wouldn’t have maybe noticed that. But he did.

Despite himself he answered the question. “No. It’s really, really not.” 

He suddenly regained control of his legs and his mind shouted at him to keep running. So he kept running. 

He heard Gwen call “Hey. Wait a minute!” 

He made a beeline for the tourist information centre. He stepped inside. 

It was dusty and there were cobwebs. Which wasn’t to say that the centre wasn’t usually dusty and full of cobwebs, but it looked a bit as if the place had not been touched in years. Not as if he hadn’t just been in here yesterday. He searched for the door release button under the counter. It was there...only it was stuck. Caked in several layers of dirt and jammed in place. 

“Come on, come on.” Ianto coaxed it. 

Nothing. 

He changed tactics. “Hey!” He shouted. “Torchwood!!!! Hello! I know you’re watching me on the CCTV. Over here! TW00004321 authorization. TW000056792. Somebody! Hello! Anyone there?” 

And hopefully he added, “Jack? Please, if you’re there Jack, open the damn door.” 

The cog door remained shut. 

Ianto did the only logical thing. He kicked the damn thing for good measure and started pounding on it. 

“Open up! Please open the hell up!” Jack!!!” 

He turned around and noticed a presence in the door frame he hadn’t seen before, staring at him. 

At some point in had walked, or rather, probably barged, Gwen Cooper.  _ PC  _ Gwen Cooper. 

She crossed her arms, and pulled a smartphone, not unlike the one Ianto had in his pocket. She hit the speaker button and pressed play. 

“ _ Gwen it’s Ianto. Ianto Jones. This is going to sound mad but there’s something gone wrong and just...call me if everything is wrong to you too. I have a feeling that because of...what’s gone wrong I won’t be in your address book, just call this number back…”  _

“Thought I recognized your voice just now. Want to tell me who you are and what this is all about?”

“I was...in a bit of a state this morning...uh, officer. Sorry. Better now. Just go ahead and ignore that.” 

“You seem like you’re in a bit of a state  _ now.”  _

“Yeah...just go ahead and arrest me for breaking and entering.” 

“Love, what’s wrong? You call me out of the blue this morning. Is it medication? Feeling not yourself?”

“It is none of those things, Gwen. Just, I am begging you here, take me out of my misery and just arrest me already.” 

“Well you see, I can’t really do that. Despite all appearances this place is still listed on the books as a public building. Technically you’re allowed to be here. I am, however, a little concerned how you know my name and number.” 

“I’m a friend of Rhys’...from the pub. Mutual friend of his and Banana Boat’s.” 

“Hmmm, that’s almost believable. How come I’ve never seen you around then?” 

“Well when I say friend what I really mean is I’ve always got the impression he doesn’t like me much...but you know.” 

“Uh Huh. And who’s this Jack you expect to be...on the other side of a solid wall of a nearly condemned building?” 

“Heard that, didn’t you? How long were you standing there, exactly?” 

“Long enough.” 

“Okay Gwen, look. I need an extra set of hands. There’s a button underneath the counter, and I can’t get it alone; it’s stuck. I think we can get it pressed if we push it together. You are  _ a lot  _ stronger than you look. If we get it pressed one of two things will happen. Either I’m crazy and it I don’t know, sets off a police alarm. And look there you are. Police. Yay.  _ Or _ I’m not quite as crazy as I think I’m going, and well...you’ll see. I’ll answer your questions. For real.” 

“Fine.” 

“Really?” 

“Well I did see you trying the button earlier.”

“You were in that doorway a  _ really _ long time weren’t you?” 

“Pretty much since you ran in here.” 

“That tracks.” 

Ianto showed her the button, and guided her hand on top of it. He placed his hands on top of hers and gave her a countdown. “One, two, three…” He pushed the damn thing with all his might without giving much thought to the fact he was crushing Gwen’s hand under his, and then finally, there was a click. And the cog door opened. 

Gwen’s eyes went wide. “What on Earth?!” She exclaimed. 

“Not necessarily Earth. Gwen Cooper, welcome to Torchwood,” said Ianto.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter hits “friendship” on my Bingo Card

“What is this?” She asked him. “You owe me answers.” 

“Right. Hi, Gwen. You don’t remember me, but we’re coworkers. We hunt aliens together. Like  _ Men in Black _ but with more Welsh accents.” 

“Oh, come off it.” 

Ianto looked around at the hub, properly for the first time since opening the cog door. 

“Oh no. This is bad.” 

“What? What’s bad? What is this place?” 

The hub was in a state. It looked as if it had been on the wrong side of a pretty nasty exploration. Shards of rock littered the ground. There was only one desk to be seen and it had been flipped over. 

Ianto tried to keep his composure. But there was a wave of emotions that was bursting to come out. This couldn’t be it. This couldn’t be the hub right now. 

He ran through the wreckage. Gwen followed, keeping his pace.

“This place is nuts…” Gwen said. 

“You don’t know the half of it.”

“What is this? Some kind of old bomb shelter?” 

“Not exactly, but you’re on the right track…”

They heard a snarl. A low growl of warning. 

“WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?” Gwen screamed. 

“I think...I think that might be Janet.” 

“Janet?” 

The snarl got louder, and closer. 

“Yep. Janet...and I don’t have weevil spray or a gun.  _ RUN _ !!!” 

He took Gwen by her wrist and dragged her towards the armory. Or where the armory should have been. It was hard to navigate with the rubble. 

Once on the other side of the shattered glass window he grabbed a handgun, and tossed Gwen another. 

“What am I supposed to do with this?” 

“Traditionally, shoot it.” 

“I’ve _never_ done that.”

“What do you mean, you’re a better shot than I am?! 

Oh...Oh no. Jack taught you to shoot...and no Jack, no memory of...Oh. Yeah, ok. Disregard all of that and stand behind me.” 

Janet came towards him. He shot several rounds, screaming before the weevil retreated. 

“Don’t kill him!” 

“I wasn’t shooting to kill! I was shooting to scare her off and it worked...god I forgot how self righteous you could be about the whole shooting aliens thing back in the day.” 

“And what was that thing?! Looked like someone in a bloody Halloween mask until it started snarling at us like that. It was almost...” 

She didn’t say  _ nonhuman  _ but Ianto knew her well enough to know that’s where her mind went. 

“The species is called Weevils. They’re a race of alien life form that lives in the sewers below Cardiff.” 

“Wait. Seriously? You weren’t having me on about the whole Men in Black thing?”

“Well if it helps, I’m usually dressed a lot sharper than this.” 

“Alright. Start explaining. Properly.” 

“Okay well like I said, it sounds completely insane. It sounds really, really just...absolutely insane. And I don’t really understand half of what’s happened today. It is not even afternoon and I’m a bit caffeine deprived but…

Okay. Yesterday, from my perspective anyways, I spent the day here. In this building. The Torchwood 3 Hub. And yesterday, from what I swear I remember, it doesn’t look like someone tried to nuke it out of existence. It looks the way it’s supposed to...a proper working archive and base of operations for cataloguing alien technology sent across time and space through the time-space rift that sits below Cardiff. (There’s a time-space riff that sits under Cardiff, that’s kind of important to emphasize here.)”

“I’m sorry, I have questions…” 

“Shhh. I’ll get to them. I’ll get to them. I sat here with my coworkers. Captain Jack Harkness, and you, Gwen Cooper. We caught a low level life form that was lost in some shoppes north of here.” 

“Low level life form?” 

“Non sapient. In this case...basically a space kitten.”

“Space kitten…”

“Basically.” 

“Anyways. After we dealt with that,” 

“That being... _ a space kitten _ …”

“Operative word  _ basically _ a space kitten. It’s not literally one, it's a life form called a Galx that’s green and...you know what, never mind this isn’t important. The important thing was we got it, caught it. Released it back home through the rift. And then you, Jack, and I spend the rest of the afternoon screwing off and eating pizza. At four o'clock we realized it was going to be a slow night, nothing was predicted to come up back through the rift again until early the next day, and even then it was such a minor spike it almost wasn’t worth dealing with. And we all went home early for once. You went home to Rhys, presumably had dinner. Jack and I went back to mine. And then I woke this morning...no one remembers anything. The hub is like this. I think Jack might be gone…he was right there in bed with me and then he just...wasn’t...

Look my best friend who has no idea who I am and thinks I’m a completly out of my mind right now (and is currently looking at me like a deer in the headlights), my boyfriend doesn’t seem to  _ exist _ and I just…it has been a fucking day and I haven’t even had any coffee.” 

Ianto finally just let himself lose it. He sat down and grabbed his knees on the ruined hub floor. He felt his eyes watering because fuck it. Fuck all of it. Jack was  _ gone  _ and he didn’t have the slightest idea how he was going to begin to sort this. 

Gwen joined him on the floor and began petting his arm slowly. 

“Alright so that’s a lot to unpack. For what it’s worth your...best friend, was it?” She smiled at him “She may not remember that relationship exactly, but doesn’t think you're crazy. This place and that Weevil thing prove at least some part of this has to be true, yeah?” 

Ianto let her lean into him some, in a half hug. 

“Still a little foggy on the details here, but this Jack, he’s your boyfriend then, yeah?” 

Ianto felt the tears fall a little harder. 

“How do you know he doesn’t seem to exist. Could he just...be somewhere else?” 

“I mean...I guess, I guess he’d have to be. He’s Jack.” 

“Alright. And this... _ rift  _ thing…I’m not sure I’m understanding that bit.” 

Ianto managed to collect himself a bit, but still felt the tears.

“The rift is like a funnel connecting different parts of space and time, at least that’s the way Jack’s always explained. Like a tear in the universe. It has one point that’s fixed here, and other ends that are loose through the universe. Different points in space, as well as time. Things come through the rift. People from the past and future. Aliens. Most of the time just stuff though. We could predict when things were due to come using the rift predictor...which is currently in shambles right over there.” He gestured vaguely to the middle of the hub. 

“So all this technology? Is that it, that you remember? It’s around here?”

“Broken around here, yeah. One of my job responsibilities is to keep this place clean and under different circumstances I think I’d just be really angry it’s like this instead of...whatever emotion it is I’m feeling now.” 

“Well, love,” said Gwen “let’s sort through it. All this mad stuff, there has to be a clue here, hasn’t there?”

“It may not be safe,” Ianto warned. “Janet wasn’t the only thing we had in the cells, and if she got out...I’m not really sure what else is running about this place.”

“Then we’ll stick together, sweetheart. Two heads and all that. Wow, this is not how I thought I’d spend my day...it really is a bit mad then? Aliens. Actual bloody aliens? In Cardiff?!”

“That’s Torchwood for you,” said Ianto. 

He let Gwen give him another little hug before she offered him a hand up. They were going to solve this. Together. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick note. There’s a reason Gwen is taking the aliens thing just a little bit better than she does in the first episode I’ll explain next chapter.


	4. Chapter 4

“You know,” Ianto said. “You’re taking this way better than the first time I remember you finding out about aliens. I mean you handled it well, considering, but you were in a little bit of denial—thinking it was something else and poking holes in all of it. Jack called it ‘Welsh complaining’. That was behind your back later, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he said that to your face too.” 

“Yeah well...Cardiff is getting weird and that bloody weirdness always seems to lead me back to bay. No one on the force could ever tell me why. And then those UNIT people started showing up, declaring quarantine zones and the like. People dying on the streets. I’ve seen things on the job I can’t bloody explain and everyone just wants to ignore them. Scratch marks and blood, and children disappearing. Rhys is convinced it’s terrorists.” 

“UNIT’s been here? In the city?” 

Gwen had a torch on her belt as part of her police kit. She flipped it on and looked about. They walked as they talked. 

“For years now. Showed up around the time the deaths and disappearances started spiking higher than they had been. Again, no one knows why; they just assume terrorism and serial killers and move on. And what do you know about UNIT, Ianto?”

He saw Gwen pick up a remote that was glowing green to examine before he could stop her. He grabbed it out of her hands and threw it as far as he could.

The following explosion made him get down, grabbing Gwen with him, as quick as he could. It wasn’t as bad as it could have been. More fireworks than force. Small blast. 

“That explodes.” He said simply. 

“Yeah, I gathered that!” 

Ianto offered her a hand up, and made a token effort to dust off his clothes. 

“UNIT’s like Torchwood. They’re just bigger and more militarized. They’re not supposed to have jurisdiction in Cardiff though...not without Torchwood’s say so. How long have they been here?” 

“A couple years or so; at least since ‘07.” Gwen looked up curiously. “What’s up that way then?” 

“Greenhouse. Shouldn’t be anything too interesting there, just flora and fauna.” 

“Right. And over that way ?” 

Ianto was quiet for a second. “Oh.” 

“Ianto?” 

“It’s uhhh...it’s Jack office.” 

Ianto followed her and then hovered in the doorway. It was in the physical location of Jack’s office. But it didn’t feel like it. Not really. There were no odds and ends unnecessarily logoed with the Torchwood insignia. No black and white photos. No eclectic alien oddies and nostalgic personal mementos. Just...a very soulless computer desk.  


And then, Ianto had a thought. “There's a computer here. Hold on. I might be able to get onto Mainframe!” He ran fully into the room and made his way over to the desktop. Desperately, he smashed some buttons on the keyboard. “Annd...I’m in.” 

Gwen looked at him, impressed. “Was your specialty? Hacking and computer stuff then?” 

“No uhhh...I mainly just make the coffee.”

“Seriously?” 

“I archive too! And do field work...I was just kind of hired to be Hub Boy before anyone would trust me with anything else.” He very deliberately chose not to explain that further. 

“And what do I do then?”

“This, essentially. Take lead on investigative things. Liaison with the police. You were still a copper before getting hired and the skills carry over; actually that’s most of the reason you got hired. Technically, you’re second in command, so my boss whenever Jack pisses off somewhere.”

“Huh…”

“‘Huh’ what?” 

“Jack is our boss and your boyfriend. You're sleeping with the boss and I still outrank you?”

“Oi!” 

She laughed and lightly slapped a hand on his arm in a friendly gesture. Despite the protest he let himself laugh a bit, really laugh a bit, for the first time today. It was comforting. Familiar. If he closed his eyes he could pretend this was normal. Being in the hub with Gwen, teasing each other the way it was supposed to be. And then he took a look at Jack’s empty office. And that brought him back to reality. 

He took a breath. Gwen looked like she had more questions. 

“But then, he’s left before. Jack?” Asked Gwen. Her eyes were big and curious. The question was asked as innocently as possible, but stung. 

Ianto did his best to keep his voice level. 

“He has. But the Hub...it really isn’t supposed to be like this. And he was right there….He came back...eventually. He always comes back.” 

The last part wasn’t spoken with a level tone despite his best efforts. Not really.

He pressed some more buttons on Mainframe and Gwen stood impressed. 

“This...this doesn’t make sense.” He said. 

A screen had popped up. Last Access Date: 8 July 2007. 

“According to this there’s been no one logged on this software at all since the Fall of Canary Wharf...and I think this place was just left to rot. But there’s still the rift...And Torchwood 3 was here before Jack!” 

“Canary Wharf? The terrorist attack?” 

Ianto laughed bitterly. “Well, at least that cover is consistent.” 

A new desperate, hopeful, idea popped into his head. He went through the search and pulled the list of the dead. He read it over. And he felt like crying completely for the second time of the day. Lisa Howlet was officially listed as deceased. 

New reality. Still no Lisa. No Lisa and no Jack. Was he cursed so that everyone he let himself love was just going to be gone? 

He wasn’t going to let himself cry again. He wasn’t it. But fuck, if he didn’t feel like it. 

He read the names one after the other. Old reminders of what was. A thought danced across his mind, a theory for a second, but then he saw it. The name Rose Tyler was listed. Still listed.  


So that was that then. Whatever had happened to Jack...well the Doctor was still mucking around the universe. Or had been a few years prior (relatively speaking) still. He wasn’t entirely sure whether that was a good thing or not. 

After a second, his eyes caught the corner of the screen. The purported current date in the corner. 

“Huh, whoever was last in Mainframe really messed about then. The time and date setting is wrong.” 

Gwen looked at it. Then at her mobile. “No, no time’s right.” 

“But the date says the year is 2010.”

“So?” 

“Oh no.” Ianto laughed almost hysterically. “Gwen what’s today’s date?”

“1st of May, 2010.” 

“When I went to bed last night it was the 1st of May, 2009.”

Carefully Ianto moved to take the metallic box out of his pocket. “What the hell did this thing do?!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And while technically the date is pre-Miracle Day, I’m counting this as future!fic on my bingo card. 
> 
> *insert evil laugh*


	5. Chapter 5

Gwen looked at the box with interest. Her eyes did that thing where they got very wide. The box began to glow blue under Ianto’s touch. 

“What is that?” 

“No idea. It was just there when I woke up.” 

“Bit relevant to leave out, Ianto.” 

“I haven’t exactly been thinking straight today...but it’s a clue. I have no sodding idea what it does or what it is. Should I have stamped a blue paw print on it? Perhaps prepare some Scooby snacks?” 

Gwen, mostly ignored the outburst, apparently recognizing it as him getting frustrated. She was no longer as familiar with quirks and habits, but he supposed the frustration was obvious even without knowing his usual demeanor. For his part, Ianto knew too well he was getting tetchy; the mounting emotional stress of the day was just as much to blame as the caffeine withdrawal. It was just past 11:30 now, and not a single cup of coffee had made its way to his lips. 

“Was it glowing like that when you found it?” She asked. 

He blinked. “It was. But it seems to go on and off. Don’t think it was glowing when it was in my pocket.” 

She tapped her hand against the desk and looked like she was thinking. “2009 then. You mentioned...you mentioned Time earlier. Like time travel?” 

In other circumstances Gwen casually asking about time travel, as if their boss wasn’t an ex time agent and former Companion to the Doctor, might have been funny. Or at least, ironic maybe? Ianto sighed. “Yeah that’s a bit old hat around here. Usually it’s everyone else doing the time traveling though.” 

“What if you searched for it? Search for the box on this computer programme?”

“Searching blue boxes on this thing is going to give me the wrong set of information. But if I set the right parameters...” 

Gwen looked at him curiously, definitely in regards to that comment about blue boxes. “Don’t worry about it, it’s not important.”  _ Yet _ anyways. 

He knew his response seemed a bit like one of the overly enigmatic lines from Jack (or even Martha, for that matter) that he honestly hated, but Gwen was surprisingly accepting of all this. He had a feeling once he explained the Doctor, he might just blow past her reasonable ceciling of suspension of disbelief. Maybe that’s why Jack tended not to explain anything at first, he wondered. But then there were a lot of things that Jack chose not to explain for no good reason. 

Rather than go down that particular road of mistrust that never led anywhere good: professionally, personally, or otherwise, Ianto decided to focus on the task at hand. 

“Let’s see, the object is metallic, small, engraved carving and has an on and off blue glow. Oh there’s something here! It’s...it’s a puzzle box? Verron Puzzle Box, to be precise.” 

“Puzzle box? Just a child’s game then?” 

“I tend not to trust things that are archived as ‘children’s games’ around here. Half the time they’re actually weapons of mass destruction. Or sex toys.” 

He scrolled through the (subpar) archival notes. “Doesn’t say what it does. Just that UNIT and Torchwood have both separately heard rumors of their existence, and UNIT briefly had one in their Black Archives (high level security lock down for extraterrestrial objects), before their Scientific Advisor took possession of it and moved it elsewhere sometime in the 70s or 80s. Lovely, UNIT dating system; always a mess. True to form, he didn’t explain what it did either before presumably disposing of it (or if he did explain, no one bothered to write it down). While in their possession it never did anything of note and they weren’t sure of its purpose. Testing indicated high levels of atron energy particles.” 

“You’re going to need to translate that last part.” 

“Time energy. Stuff that comes through the rift is usually drenched in it though, so that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily that important. Could just be well, background radiation essentially. Although if their scientific advisor was interested in it...”

Gwen reached for the object, with the intent of getting a closer look. As soon as she touched it there was a very bright glow. Her lips parted and her stare was far away.

“Ianto?” She stared at him with a growing intensity. 

“I...I remember...howwww??? This isn’t possible. God this isn’t  _ bloody  _ possible.” 

“Gwen?” 

She started crying, and there was something in her eye, something as hysterical as Ianto felt this morning. 

“How...oh god how are we in the Hub? How are you alive?!” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have I earned the major character undeath tag yet?


	6. Chapter 6

Gwen took him in a very tight hug, as if she’d let go then he’d disappear. It was her turn to cry now, her face wet as the tears made their way down her cheeks. “Ianto. Oh my god, Ianto.” She repeated that again, and again. “This can’t be...oh my God.” 

There was a lot Ianto wasn’t understanding about today. But this about took the cake. 

“Alive? Gwen what the hell are you talking about?!” 

Gwen had still not let go, and instead moved slightly to look at his face. She gingerly touched the side of his cheek. 

“No scar. No...oh, god what the hell, Ianto?!” She hugged him again. She was crying completely now, and wasn’t breaking him out of the hug. “Ianto…” She buried her head into her shoulder. “… _ annwyl Duw… _ Ianto... _ ”  _

Like they’d done before, they ended up on the floor. Gwen was a very touchy person who thrived on physical contact. Not as much as Jack, who would use full on mouth kisses as friendly greetings at all times if the cultural norms of the twenty first century would let him, but close enough to it. She liked to comfort others with hugs, little shoulder touches, and little brushes of her fingers. Ianto was not a touchy person, not really (at least not outside of a romantic context— he liked kisses and cuddles and more intimate acts a lot in that particular context). But, between Gwen and Jack he’d learn to accept little brushes of touch as friendly affection; as a way of communication that benefited not only the person being comforted, but the one comforting them. She moved for him to be in a cuddle. Finally, after she felt she had him cuddled close enough, she managed to collect herself enough to begin to explain. 

“I...I touched that box and I remembered...I remembered Torchwood and Jack and our lives and everything...and then I remembered. Fuck...I remembered the worst  _ fucking _ thing. 

You...oh my god, Ianto you...died. There were these aliens called the 456...or that’s what they called them anyways. The government. They did this, this thing...to the world’s children where they made kids talk in unison. Like radio waves. They demanded 10 percent of the children on Earth to...well to kill. To kill and mutilate then get high off of them, like a drug. They were going to kill so many children. The government was going to let them and they didn’t want us involved. They didn’t want us involved so badly they blew this place up; worse than this. The whole Plass went in the blast there was nothing left. They did it by going after Jack...We barely got out of here alive. You jailbroke Jack from where they were holding him and we were on the run, the three of us plus Rhys. And then we pieced it all together. What the 456 were up to, the selfish fucking reason the government was just going to let them...let them take all the kids. So many kids. You and Jack went to confront them and they...oh God Ianto they….”

She was sobbing. Her breathing was short and labored. “They released this poison into the air. They...god, they killed you. They killed you and everyone else that was inside of Thames House, where they kept the tank those monsters were in. They had everyone in body bags laid out on the floor and you...god Ianto you were so still and...” 

She sobbed into his shoulder. In turn, he simply stared in shock. Unsure of what to say. He didn’t remember being dead. He wasn’t...he hadn’t been? But Gwen was next to him, crying her eyes out and to her this had been  _ real.  _ As real as the timeline Ianto remembered from before this morning. And that had meant...he parted his mouth open slightly.  _ Oh.  _

She hugged him tight again. “Ianto…” 

She stayed in the hug, and looked like she was refusing to break it. 

“I don’t...I don’t know how I forgot. You. Jack. All of this. It just... _ Christ.  _ It’s like breaking Retcon but so much worse. And you...God.” 

The hug was tight and desperate and he could feel the wet sobs beginning to soak into his shirt. Soaked into the sorry excuse for a button up he’d fished out a wardrobe that didn’t feel like his. “You’re here. You’re really here.”

He hugged her back, carefully and slowly. He tried to let her know he was still there through the hug. “Shhh. I’m here, Gwen. Right here. Very much alive. Confused and not really sure what’s going on...but right here.”

“Don’t you EVER do that to me again! I have no idea what’s going on here either, but I swear to God if you die on me again… _ Cachu sanctaidd _ , you’re really... God, Ianto...” 

Ianto did not think the hug could get tighter. He was wrong. Awkwardly, he continued to hug her back.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gwen’s gratuitous Welsh was translated via Google Translate so I apologize if it’s wrong. 
> 
> annwyl Duw - dear God 
> 
> Cachu sanctaidd - Holy shit


	7. Chapter 7

It had taken a while for them to get off the floor. For Gwen to finally willingly break the hug, although she still hovered close as she snapped back into investigative mode. Back into Torchwood mode. 

“Okay. Okay. Think…” Gwen said aloud. “What else does Mainframe say about the box?” 

Gwen peered over the computer screen. “Only useful thing here really is the bit with Atron Energy, and the bit about the scientific advisor is Jack’s Doctor isn’t it?” 

She paced.

“Alright so you’re from my past. But this isn’t just a past/future thing. The timeline was definitely rewritten whole cloth, like after Bilis. Between UNIT being around, how long Mainframe sat inactive, the fact I’m still a bloody PC….”

“There’s more too,” Ianto admitted. “Lisa was listed on the official list of dead for Canary Wharf. She wasn’t...originally.” 

Maybe he could have successfully made his expression blankier if he hadn’t already been running on empty. 

Gwen flinched in reaction. “I’m sorry, pet.” She did that thing where she placed a comforting hand on his arm. He couldn’t help but notice the contact held longer than it usually did when she did that. 

“Also I have a flatmate and work for the Cardiff museum,” he added in a deadpan. “He’s English and he moved my coffee machine from the optional counter spot.” 

“And you didn’t kill him?”

“I was a little preoccupied with Jack being gone...but the coffee machine  _ really _ pissed me off.” 

Once again she made contact with his arm as she laughed, as if she was still afraid that losing contact would make him go away. 

Just then, Gwen’s mobile rang. She looked down at the screen. “Shit. It’s Andy. We’ve been down here a while and he must be wondering where I’m at.” 

“Answer it and put him off. Say you chased me down because you thought I was involved in whatever you were looking into at the opera house and I gave you the slip or something…” 

“Yeah, yeah. That’s good. And he’ll cover for me.” 

She took the call, and used Ianto’s cover story. He could very easily imagine Andy’s exasperated lines on the other end as he attempted to chew Gwen out for running off, and then relenting due to the fact he absolutely would cover for her even though it wasn’t protocol. Gwen hung up the call. 

“You know in the timeline I remember...he’d just been promoted.  _ Sergeant  _ Andy Davidson.” 

“Really?!” Said Ianto, honestly intrigued by the bit of gossip surrounding their colleague. 

“Guess for all the grief we gave him, being the Torchwood contact guy gave him some clout in the department.” 

Ianto considered her words for a second. “ _ Gave _ ...?” 

“There’s no more Torchwood, Ianto. Jack...he left. After you...and everything...he couldn’t bear to stay here. He went off to be not on the planet. I guess Earth just wasn’t big enough for him to grieve.” 

“Oh…” 

Ianto stared blankly for a second. Truthfully, as much as he loved Jack, he never expected him to do anything but move on once he eventually met his Torchwood issue, inevitably young and weird, death. And that Torchwood, and Jack with it, would always just...be here. Carrying on as always. That he would die and the hub would continue on, and eventually Jack and Gwen would hire his replacement. That eventually Gwen would have the good sense to leave this place, and settle down in the country somewhere with Rhys so as to stave off the chances of her own young and weird demise. Of course Jack would take another lover; maybe this one would last long enough for Jack to manage to say those damn three little words to. Time would continue on, whether or not Ianto Jones was part of it. 

And that was when he realized it. “God is that where he is then? Galavanting around some random starship?” 

“I don’t know, pet. But I think...I think there’s more here. The timeline I remember...it’s been rewritten. So that must mean it’s the bad one. The one that isn’t supposed to happen.” 

Ianto did not say ‘or they’re the same timeline, just different points of it.’ But he did think about it. That the horrible future’s past Gwen remembered was very likely waiting for him in a few months time from his last set of memories. Instead he said something that was for as much Gwen’s benefit as his own. 

“Jack always said ‘Time Can Be Rewritten’.” 

“Yeah. Yeah he did.” She blinked, and then he could see the moment she made a decision as a certain kind of resolve danced across her eyes. “Okay, let’s grab what we can from here. Guns. Stun guns. The contacts if we can find them. Energy scanners. Anything that should be useful and can be hidden away...we can always get on Mainframe from our phones with the right access codes. Let’s just get out of here and regroup. Because hell, we’re going to fix this timeline. We’re going to find Jack bloody Harkness. And bring back Torchwood while we’re at it.”


	8. Chapter 8

Truthfully it had always been the act of making coffee that served to calm Ianto’s nerves down. Watching it flow through the machine and having control over it. He wished he was making it, rather than sitting in a cafe drinking just passable mass produced coffee someone else had brewed. But still, the smell also helped to calm his nerves, the familiar taste, and his craving for caffeine sated. The large sandwich sitting next to him helped too; he hadn’t eaten at all since waking up in the morning. 

He and Gwen sat across from each other at a small table, a little at the back. View of the door in case of...who even knew? The thing about Torchwood was it taught you to be paranoid, even if you weren’t sure what you were paranoid about. In the very least, he was paranoid about the gun Gwen had rather conspicuously hidden below her puffy PC jacket and the odd bits of technology he shoved in his pocket. 

Gwen had accessed Mainframe on her phone and was typing away; Ianto had accessed the program too, but was much more passively scrolling through archive notes on tech, trying to get a sense of what was and wasn’t catalogued and if there was a clue within (so far, the answer was no). 

“Let me see if I can hack UNIT,” said Gwen “if they’ve been more active they’ll have to know more about anomalies and what not.”

“Just be careful,” said Ianto. “The last thing we need is for them to notice the hack and try coming after us in ‘ask questions later’ mode.” 

She nodded. “I’ve never been as neat as Tosh was about covering my tracks…should be able to though.” 

Ianto watched with mild amusement as Gwen performed the same hacking task that earlier, in her timeline induced amnesiac state, she’d found impressive. 

She bit her lip. “Ianto, you found news reports for Canary Wharf?” 

He did not like where this could be going. “Yes?”

“It’s just...every world wide extraterrestrial phenomenon aside from the ones you can put down to terrorism like, well, you know...they’re gone.”

“What do you mean?” 

“Well I had a hunch that maybe we could track Jack down if we searched for big universal events that he might have…”

“Followed the Doctor to?”

“Pretty much that, yeah. But it’s like they’re gone. Even the ones we were there for. The Planets in the Sky? Not even a trace of that super eclipse and hallucinations in the water story we planted. It’s just like that day was completely uneventful. The last four years of Christmases look like actual slow news days...and not just because UNIT’s PR department managed to spin them that way. Even with Canary Wharf...the deaths are counted but not a word about the Cybermen. No ghosts and nothing on the mass hallucinations line that should be circulated.”

Ianto shrugged “maybe it’s just the Cardiff effect?”

“You’re going to have to explain that one, sweetheart.”

“Everyone knows, or should know when the universe is sorted, that we exist despite our best efforts. ‘Bloody Torchwood’, and all that. But they keep on with their day because thinking about it is too hard to process. So they just...quietly ignore the rampant Weevil infestations. Cardiff Effect.” 

“Ahhh. _That_. This just seems...too big to be that. Like these events just genuinely didn’t happen.” 

Ianto wished, not for the first time, that they had a time traveler on hand. “You wouldn’t happen to know if Martha is still off the grid, would you?” 

“Her and Mickey. They’d just gotten married before everything went to shit last year.”

Ianto blinked slightly. Last night, relatively speaking, he’d most definitely walked by an invitation to that particular event hanging on a refrigerator magnet. He’d planned on buying the toaster oven off their registry. “Oh...good for Martha, I guess. I was just hoping that maybe UNIT had a contact number for her.” 

“Sorry. I did have it just…”

“Saved in your phone contacts?” Ianto said wryly. 

She shared the wryly half smile. “How’d you guess?” 

Ianto clicked around the UNIT files a bit. “Oh hold on, looks like one Sarah Jane Smith is still at 13 Bannerman Road, Ealing, London. And I bet that supercomputer of hers might have some kind of theory to work off of at least. She’s not exactly Torchwood’s biggest fan, but she always seemed to like Jack on a personal level regardless...and no active Torchwood might actually work to our advantage here. Yes! Looks like they’ve got an email on file too...we can send her a note. Maybe a little coded in case she doesn’t remember us exactly, though it looks like she was mucking around UNIT facilities recently so that shouldn’t be too much of a concern…” 

They both shared slight smiles. Finally something resembling a solid plan forward, then. 

Gwen continued to click through the phone some and nodded. 

“Right, that’s sorted then. But...what now?” He asked. 

“I don’t think we should split up,” she said. “I only remembered because I touched that box; if I get too far away from it do I forget all over again?”

“That wouldn’t exactly be ideal; I’d have to give you the ‘aliens are real’ spiel all over again.” 

“I probably shouldn’t be running all around the city in this get up either. I should have a change of clothes back at the station, but I can’t exactly bring you with me...Guess I can slip home, but I’m not sure how to explain you to Rhys.” 

“I will literally pay you to explain me to Rhys. I can casually leaf through a magazine while you get changed for the full effect.” They both shared a small laugh at the mental image. 

Her smile lit up wide. “Actually, we  _ should  _ go back to mine. There’s someone I want you to meet, Ianto.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is mostly a bit of a breather once Plot happens in the next one, but there’s some important plot mixed in here. 
> 
> Daily updates might slow down (because Plot).


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for Plot and technobabble

Anwen Williams had her father’s face and her mother’s big eyes. She looked curious about the world and everything in it. 

Ianto had never been one for babies, or kids in general, but there was just something so  _ Gwen  _ in her daughter that filled him with joy. She was also so  _ very  _ tiny and Ianto might have been a little afraid of breaking her. But still he held her, looking down at the little doe eye child with amazement. 

Gwen had a daughter. It was such a strange thing to wrap his head around. 

Gwen smiled wide as Ianto gingerly held the very small child. “You know, you found out before Rhys did. You and Jack both. I used the medical scanner at the Hub.” 

“Oh I bet Rhys  _ loved  _ that.” Ianto laughed. Anwen looked back up at him. 

There was something in Gwen’s expression that was a bit hard to pin down, that reminded him a bit of her emotionally turbulent expression after she’d first touched the box. But instead of giving into whatever emotion had danced across her face, she visibly bit it back and instead once again smiled wide as she looked affectionately down at the two of them. 

“You like your Uncle Ianto, don’t you sweetheart?” She cooed. 

Anwen was probably too young to really respond or understand, but Ianto swore she cooed back up at him. Once again he found himself looking between mother and daughter. Once again Gwen made a strange expression. “Sorry,” she said. “I just...I didn’t think I’d ever get to say that.” 

Ianto’s mouth moved to make a silent  _ oh _ expression in understanding. 

“I’m happy. I’m really, really happy; it’s just a lot to take in, you know?” 

As he sat rocking the infant Ianto began to get lost in thought. Earlier, Gwen had called ahead to her babysitter, a local college girl called Olivia, that she’d be home early. Her shift was due to end on the force soon enough, and she had decided she didn’t much care if she got shit for slacking off seeing as how if they played their cards right, Time was likely to rewrite itself anyway. 

Olivia had happily agreed to take off early; mumbling something about wanting to start revising for an exam and not even giving Ianto a second glance as they walked in and Gwen spat out some half thought out story about him being a cousin. Rhys, as Gwen had explained, was due back soon, having picked up a hauling job up the coast and back; his first long one since Anwen was born and Gwen’s quick return from maternity leave. She had given it another two hours or so. Ianto wondered if there was a limit to how many people the box could wake up, or if Gwen was going to awkwardly try to tell her husband he was a cousin that didn’t show up to their wedding and he’d never heard of. 

As he mulled over this, Ianto’s mobile began to ring. A video call. This phone, while high tech, didn’t do video calls yet — but he had one waiting for him. Carefully, he handed Anwen back to Gwen and looked at London area code that flashed across the screen. 

He had never met Sarah Jane in person. All of their (very limited) contact had always been like this, video over the subwave network, or routing calls to Jack. He knew that she was close with Mickey, and by proxy had become close with Martha. He also knew she was scarily competent for running her operations out of an attic with a small collection of teenagers and a robot dog. He’d read the files. They’d defeated a Sontaran with little more than her neighbor’s high heeled shoe. Ianto’s feelings about the Doctor had been well, messy to say the least, but he couldn’t deny he chose his friends well. 

“Sarah Jane Smith?” He asked carefully. 

“Ianto Jones.” She announced. “The funniest thing happened. You sent me an email earlier that sounded like you needed help finding a friend of the Doctor’s. Not in so many words, but you clearly wanted me to read between the lines. Only I was convinced I’d never heard of that friend, or you. But something felt wrong, like a nagging feeling in the back of my mind. On a hunch, I got this out.” 

She showed a very familiar box to the screen. Ianto took the matching one out of his pocket. Once again it glowed blue. 

“It was given to me by a Verron Soothsayer. It’s been used twice since it came into my possession; both times it shielded its users from chaos by the inter dimensional being, The Trickster. This box, it protects you from changed timelines. It allows you to remember what was, what should be. Today, I touched it and I remembered a recent visit from the Doctor. A quite world changing visit I must say, involving a small family of people across time, including one Captain Jack Harkness. Where we worked together and did something dangerous and challenging, but brave and fantastic. I piloted the Tardis and hauled planets across the sky. How do you forget that?”

“You forgot that you hauled planets?” Ianto asked for emphasis. 

“And that, Mr. Jones, is what I don’t understand. Time can be rewritten, but it shouldn’t rewrite events involving a Tardis from someone that traveled in one. Those events are protected. Something big happened. The universe, Time. Something bigger than us. And I don’t think it’s stable.” 

Gwen and Ianto exchanged looks. 

And to be frank,” she continued. “your email wasn’t the only one I’ve gotten that was worrying. A government contact emailed me about a tip for a story...after I activated the box, I remembered that I attended her funeral last year.”

Gwen’s face paled. “Was she...was she in Thames House in July 2009?” 

“She was. To drop off paperwork to resign, I was told.” 

Gwen stared, very stil, at the video screen. 

“The timelines are trying very hard to stitch together, and it’s almost working. But some of the readings I’m getting; the energy levels are off the scale. It’s almost like Time bleeding through. More than a simple time fisher…” 

“Like an open Rift?” Guessed Ianto. “Which should be impossible on that scale outside of Cardiff.” 

“Exactly,” said Sarah Jane. 

“Something had to have gone very wrong. A linear rewrite on a cosmetic scale, a very drastically changed fixed point…” 

Oh no. 

“Jack’s a fixed point.” He said. 

“What?” Asked Gwen. 

“Jack, his immorality, he’s a fixed point. Gwen, has Jack ever explained how his immortality worked to you?” 

“Only in the vaguest, most cryptic terms, but what else is new? He told me he was waiting for the Doctor to fix him, and then when he found him again that there was nothing to fix.”

Ianto sighed. “Typical Jack. He’s a living fixed point in time. An event (or in his case person) that can’t be changed. And you have no idea how hard it was to get that straight answer out of him when I asked him for it — honestly I cheated and asked Martha to fill some holes in the explanation once he told me.” 

“Fixed points are tricky,” explained Sarah Jane. “There’s multiple things that can cause one. The most common is your own timeline. If you know something happened to you in your own personal past then you cannot change it (unless someone else changed it that is). But there’s also certain historical events that have to happen for time to play out correctly, and certain people that have to live or die at certain points. Without them Time doesn’t flow correctly and becomes unstable. Either Time compensates by creating bleaker timelines or, well, the worst consequence is the Universe starts tearing itself itself apart.” 

“But someone did change our timeline,” said Gwen. “Completely. And it’s a timeline that includes  _ Jack _ . Even if he wasn’t some kind of immortal fixed point…thing, wouldn’t taking someone like him out of our timelines mess things up on principle?” 

“It can be done,” said Sarah Jane. “But I agree, it’s difficult. The first time this box was used the Trickster managed to influence time enough that all the events where I had personally saved the world were altered so the beings that caused that chaos simply hadn’t come to Earth. But then found a point in my timeline where I had to exist or else a meteor would have destroyed us.” 

“Is that who you think did this?” Asked Ianto “The Trickster?” 

“It’s possible. But at the scale this seems to be. I almost wonder if it was something else.” 

“What?” Asked Gwen. 

Ianto sighed very deeply, having a pretty good idea as to where this was heading. Because, of course. “I think Gwen, the correct question is ‘Who?’” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be totally honest I cannot math and kind of messed up Anwen’s age (I was thinking mostly about Ianto’s timeline and the timeline for something that comes later when I chose the dates). It still works but it means that Gwen’s maternity leave was short. Like US service industry maternity leave, short. So basically assuming Gwen had a typical healthy 9 month pregnancy, Anwen is still very Tiny.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings for lots more plot and technobabble

“The Doctor,” Ianto clarified. “He had to have done something. Something that affected the universe. And somehow Jack got dragged into it all. And us with him.” 

On the other side of the screen Sarah Jane gave the slightest of nods in agreement. “I can’t prove it, but it would certainly explain the anomalies. Although knowing how the Doctor operates, I would suspect that it was more likely something happened to  _ him _ , and whatever’s happened to the universe, and Jack in turn, is a result of his attempt to fix it.”

“A fix that’s being held together with duct tape from the sound of it,” muttered Ianto. 

“Sarah Jane, do you have a way of contacting the Doctor?” asked Gwen hopefully. 

“Unfortunately, Mr. Smith already tried ringing him. We haven’t been able to get through.” 

Ianto frowned. There had to be something. He wasn’t going to just sit back and let the Doctor sort this when Jack was gone and he was dealing with the complete whirlwind of a day he was having. Especially if the Doctor’s attempts at sorting it were partially the reason Jack was gone and the timelines were amiss to begin with. 

“Wait,” he said as an idea flickered across his mind. “Jack’s vortex manipulator. I know the codes to hone in on it, but Mainframe isn’t powerful enough on its own. Do you think your Mr. Smith could run them?”

“But of course,” said a voice that was both proper and a bit electronic. Well, there was something Ianto absolutely was never going to get used to; talking sentantiant computers. 

“He has those codes memorized, but he never bothered to learn Martha’s phone number,” said Gwen in a bit of a sing-song teasing voice. As Ianto went to glare at her for that, she was looking down at Anwen, giggling some. He bit back the slight smile that was fighting its way into his face in response to her. 

He let out a small chuckle despite himself and rattled off the codes. 

“I have found a location,” came the computer’s voice. “It would seem the vortex manipulator you say belongs to Captain Harkness has been traced to the Unified Intelligence Task Force in London. The Black Archives.” 

Both Ianto and Gwen sat up in their seats. 

“That’s it then? He’s here? Just at UNIT?” Said Gwen. 

“It was entered into UNIT’s archives in 2007,” said Mr. Smith. “There is no note indicating It belonged Captain Harkness, or even of his existence. Only that a 51st Century Vortex Manipulator was salvaged from the wreckage of an incident at Canary Wharf that led to the end of the organization known as Torchwood, and that it matches those base codes. It would seem, if I may oppine, for some reason the timeline fought to persevere the vortex manipulator but not Captain Harkness.”

Ianto silently cursed. Both at the fact that he hadn’t thought to search the archive notes for the vortex manipulator when he was poking around them, and for the fact that this was feeling a bit like a dead end. Something about Sarah Jane gave off a “no cursing in front of this woman” vibe (he supposed it was simply that she was the mother of a young teenager), so he did his best not to voice it. Instead, he traced the ornate designs along the puzzle box, concentrating on the little nooks and crannies. 

The phone began to buzz. Ianto and Gwen both looked down in confusion as a second call merged in with their own. And on screen was Martha Jones (or Martha Smith-Jones now, he supposed) and Mickey Smith, holding up on a puzzle box of their own. 

“I hope you don’t mind, but I took the liberty of calling some friends when I got your note earlier,” said Sarah Jane with a little smile. 

Ianto felt the smile tug at the side of his mouth as Gwen’s grew very wide. 

“Martha!” She exclaimed. “God, we’ve been wanting to get a hold of you two all day!” 

“Ianto! It’s really you!” Exclaimed Martha. “When Sarah Jane told me I didn’t believe it. Oh  _ god _ .” 

She didn’t break down the way Gwen had, but the sheer disbelief was palatable even through the screen as she stared. 

“We still haven’t worked how or even really why,” said Gwen, “but I’m not exactly looking that gift horse in the mouth at the moment.” 

Martha nodded, her eyes still fixed primarily on Ianto. She held up a very similar looking box. “This was at my bedside table early this morning. In the timeline I remembered everything stayed close to the same for me, except the details of why I left UNIT were different, and for some reason I’d never consulted with Torchwood. And of course the biggest difference, I couldn’t work out what’d happened that finally pushed me to stop traveling with the Doctor.  _ Or why I was so miserable on my honeymoon _ .” 

The last part was a bit of whisper, and he felt Gwen get tense next him. Something to do with him then,  _ ahhh.  _

“I, however, apparently still work at a mechanic’s shop,” said Mickey. “Martha and I were still married but even with the Timeline rewrite stuff a lot about my supposed life story didn’t make a whole lot of sense. I guess I did some bouts of traveling — it tried to write around my time in the other Universe. As soon as I touched we remembered you lot.” 

Ianto looked down at the box. “Someone planted these for us to find,” he said. 

“I think so,” said Martha. “I know Sarah Jane already had one, but I’d never seen one myself before.” 

Gwen bit her lip. “What now?”

“You got me,” said Mickey. “The missing bits of our memories, they were mostly tied to Jack in some way or another.” 

“Our only real clue aside from these boxes is Jack’s vortex manipulator,” said Gwen. 

“Then we should get ahold of it,” said Ianto. “Even if it’s nothing, at least it’s...he’d want us to have it.”

“Then we’ll go to UNIT and we’ll take it,” said Gwen. “We have more of a right to it then they do”. 

“That’s going to be a job for you lot,” said Sarah Jane. 

“Why is that?” Asked Gwen. 

“Because I already broke into the Black Archives once this year. And I can’t exactly have UNIT poking around this place, asking questions I’m not willing to answer about my son, all because I keep nicking their toys. And no offense, but I do know how Torchwood operates. Still too many guns.” 

“Right then, field trip.” Said Ianto dryly. 

“I hate London,” said Gwen. 


	11. Chapter 11

Ianto had tried to nap on the ride to London in his spot in the passenger seat of Gwen’s car. One nightmare where he’d rather pathetically called out for Jack in his sleep, followed immediately by seeing Gwen giving him one of those big eyed expressions of concern as he woke up from it, had squashed that idea. He didn’t want to have nightmares, he didn’t want to break down over Jack again, and definitely did not want Gwen worrying about him. Least of all while she was driving across the Severn Bridge. 

The three hour drive in Gwen’s little car had given them the chance to test some things. Earlier Rhys had come home and immediately called Gwen on her bullshit cousin story, having had rather loudly demanded to know who the stranger holding his infant child on the sofa was, and why his wife was very obviously lying about it. Rather than subject the couple to a prolonged domestic, Ianto had Rhys touch the puzzle box. There was still screaming when Rhys suddenly remembered the presumed dead man sitting on his sofa, but with a much more jovial tone and a different flavor of confusion than it had been before. The awkward bro hug he’d received had quite made the whole affair worth it. 

Gwen had quickly explained (as much as Gwen ever seemed to explain these things to Rhys), that they were caught in a rather complicated time related issue, bigger than the rift, and that they needed to get to London to meet with Martha and Mickey. And won’t you take Anwen for the night and possibly most of tomorrow, love? 

An hour into the three hour trip, and Gwen had called Rhys to check in. He’d ask her how the double night shift at the station was treating her. 

“Out of proximity then,” said Ianto. “He forgot.” 

“I know that’s how these things work,” she said. “But I was hoping he wouldn’t.”

Ianto could only nod at that. He and Gwen had already decided they weren’t going to split up, but now he was really feeling the importance of that choice. 

They spent the rest of the trip in an oddly companionable silence (Gwen was usually a lot more talkative when she drove, and usually had a lot more complaints to hurl at the English). Finally, the two made their way to an agreed upon street corner on the outskirts of London. There Ianto was very, very tightly hugged by a slightly teary eyed Martha Jones. 

The  group quickly went through the finer points of an agreed upon plan. 

“Let’s do this,” declared Gwen with determination. 

And it was on.   


* * *

It was dark when Martha drove up to the checkpoint, her ID flashed at the window of her enclosed black Jeep. Ianto made a mental note to tease her for copying the SUV when the situation was less immediate. 

“Dr. Jones, we were under the impression you’d gone freelance,” said the officer. 

“Called in to consult. Suspected unstable timelines and the reason for my medical expertise, people who were thought dead reappearing,” she said evenly. “There’s certain tools located in the archives that are thought to be of use.” Using the truth to lie. Ianto approved. And then she added “It’s actually Dr. Smith-Jones now, Lieutenant.” 

“Right, of course. Congratulations ma’am. We just need to check the ID. Since that incident involving Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and Sarah Jane Smith entering the Black Archives without the proper authorizations, we have to check, you understand. Ms. Smith might be quite the legend, but that doesn’t change the fact that her security clearances don’t allow her to shop for whatever she wants around here.” 

“Of course, although I promise you, the Doctor’s companions wouldn’t try the same trick twice.” 

The officer was on his way as Martha lifted the tarp on the back of her Jeep up. “Torchwood however, I’m not sure I can say the same about.” 

“We owe you one,” said Gwen.

“You owe me loads,” corrected Martha. “Now hurry up before they see you two.” 

Ianto and Gwen were off. UNIT archives operated on the same principles as Torchwood, with the exception of their bzytantine dating system that could cause confusion between entire decades. Still, Ianto found it easy enough to navigate the warehouse. V. V for vortex manipulator. Date 51st Century. In the subcategories for Time, Time Travel, or Time Agency. Alphabetical and dated. 

“Watch out!” Called Mickey on the Coms from off site, as he watched hacked CCTV footage (routed to him by a certain alien computer that most definitely “was not involved in any way”). “Company North of you.” 

Ianto glanced at his phone where Mickey had sent him a rough map of the archive. 

“Head West through the beginning for the T’s. There’s a row of shelving you should be able to hide behind, but scan first for dangerous materials,” Mickey instructed. 

Ianto read the scan. Nothing explosive and no energy readings that suggested something like a Time Lock if they hit into the wrong thing. He grabbed Gwen and they hid behind what looked like a giant vase, as the two waited for the clear. 

It was a good hiding spot. But company found them anyway. Two UNIT shoulders rounded the corner. One of them pulled a gun out. 

_ Shit.  _

“Ianto!” hissed Gwen as he made his way out of the hiding spot towards the gun wielding patrol. 

He brandished his stun gun, and hit him in the chest. And the man’s partner for good measure. 

“Run!” he said. 

They ran. Past the U’s for Uvodni. Straight down to the Vs Venusian artifacts from mostly likely the 70s (seriously  _ fuck  _ whoever came up with these dating systems). And finally to Vo the beginning of Vortex Manipulator. 

“This should be it!” called Ianto. Gwen took out her gun prepared to shoot any company coming their way. 

Vortex Manipulator, 51st Century, Time Agency read a museum like pedestal display. It was empty except for a note. 

_ Needed to borrow this, Sweetie XoXo River  _

_PS Team TW: Amelia Pond. Scotland._

A security alarm began to blare. 


	12. Chapter 12

Gwen and Ianto ran. Their guns were out and ready, as they back tracked through the archives towards any kind of exit. The alarm continued to blare. 

“Shit!” said Gwen. “They’ll have full troops mobilized any moment.” 

“Hold on, run to the Ts,” said Ianto. “I have an idea!” 

They continued to run, the room glowed red under the alarm’s light. 

Finally they made it to the Ts. To the “Tor” section. 

“Oh bloody hell!” said Gwen as realization dawned on her. 

“Well,” said Ianto. “It would seem in this timeline Torchwood stopped operating in 2007. And guess who got all our toys that didn’t get left to rot in Cardiff. It looks like she’s still here.” 

There parked in the garage- like structure of the archive, was the Torchwood SUV. And Ianto could just barely spy through the tinted window, a key in the ignition. 

Using a series of skills no one usually asked how he acquired, he plopped the door open. Gwen came in behind him. He threw his foot on the gas pedal. 

“Bloody hell,” said Mickey over the comms. 

“That seems to be the general sentiment,” said Ianto. 

“There’s an open garage door East of you, but you’ll have to gun it,” said Mickey’s voice. 

“Right then,” said Ianto. 

At 160 kilometers per mile, they raced out of the facility. 

Gwen’s phone pinged with a text. “It’s Martha. She said she’s playing along with UNIT ‘helping them look for the intruders’ until she can slip out before the questions aimed at her start. That should buy us some time to regroup.”   


Ianto pulled over on a random side street. The SUV was anything but subtle, but the road was dark and poorly lit, and helped the dark car blend into the shadows. 

After a beat Gwen broke into a large gap toothed smile. “We just bloody did that!” 

Ianto laughed a little hysterically. “Yeah, yeah we did!” 

They hugged from their respective car seats. 

Once the euphoria went down some, Ianto pulled out the crumpled note in his pocket and examined it, ready to begin thinking about the latest piece of the mess. Gwen peaked over at it. 

“Team TW?” said Gwen. “Do you think that maybe this note was meant for us? Team Torchwood, it works with the intitals.” 

“Don’t know,” said Ianto. 

“And where’s Amelia Pond?” asked Gwen, searching over the GPS program. “Is that some kind of village? A park? Only location that pulls up is some road in Florida near Disney World. Nothing in Scotland.” 

“I think it’s a person,” said Ianto. He clicked the PDA. “Oh wait. Here we go. Amelia Pond of Leadworth, Scotland. There’s a marriage license application here for a marriage to one Rory Williams...oh. Oh for a wedding  _ today _ . The party will probably be just winding down. And medical records...a lot of childhood psychiatric here.” 

Ianto read them over. “Are you  _ bloody  _ kidding me!” 

“What is it?” 

“Amelia ‘Amy’ Pond. At age eight she began claiming that a man flew into her garden, crashed through the shed, and ate custard and fish sticks.” 

“Gross. That bit about the shed’s odd though.” 

“But here’s the best part. She called this man her raggedy  _ Doctor,  _ and claimed that he crashed through the shed with a blue box. There’s pictures she drew of it in the file.” 

It was Gwen’s turn to exclaim “oh bloody hell”, again as she examined a photocopied child’s drawing that was clearly the Tardis. 

“And her shed  _ was  _ destroyed. It’s just no one could work out how and thought she attached herself to this fantasy to cover up some kind of trauma associated with it. And then she held onto her imaginary friend much longer than the adults in her life deemed appropriate. 

See the thing is though, everything in her file suggests a lonely young girl who grew up without parents, and maybe attached herself to this supposed fantasy as a way of being less lonely.  _ Except _ ...her parents are alive and well. But there’s no more of them in any of these files. Almost as if they weren’t there when these files were compiled and then they were. Or that Amy didn’t know them at the time.” 

“You know I hate Scotland a good deal less than England,” announced Gwen. 


	13. Chapter 13

“It’s an eight hour drive from here,” said Ianto. “If this Amelia Pond woman is at her wedding we need to get there as soon as possible — there’s a good chance she’ll leave the country for the honeymoon.” 

“A flight would only be a little over an hour,” said Gwen. “Hour and a half at the most.” 

Ianto looked thoughtful. “UNIT will be looking for us, but it’s where our relative anonymity would work to our advantage in this timeline. They know what we looked like from their security footage, but they don’t know our names, and wouldn’t think to look for a random museum worker and police officer from Cardiff hopping on a plane together. We wouldn’t even have to have aliases to hop on the next flight.” 

He clicked some buttons on his phone . “Perfect. Two seats available next to each other to Gloucestershire, nearest city to Leadworth, we have about 45 minutes to board and get through security. Huh, kind of close to the Welsh border, that town is. It’d almost be nice if this weird little scavenger was less...circular.” 

Gwen sighed. “I hate to say it, but we do need to ditch the SUV before heading to the airport.” 

Ianto made an instinctive noise of protest. 

“I know it’s ours, pet, but they’ll be looking for it. It’s pretty easy to spot what, with the logos all over it, and my car is back a little ways back where we met up with Martha.” 

Ianto felt himself deflate some. What Gwen was saying made sense, but it was a piece of Jack that was physical, the way he was hoping his wrist strap would be. 

“I can’t even tease you for losing the SUV last time,” said Gwen. “It was right before...well you didn’t do that bit from your perspective.” 

“I did not, nor would I ever, lose the SUV, Gwen.” 

“Got it stolen on the estate when you went to visit your sister,” said Gwen. “Right from under you.” 

“Nope. Do not believe it. It’s break in proof.” 

“This damn thing has gotten stolen so many times you cannot actually believe that.”

“From the rest of you. Not from  _ me.”  _

“Ohhh so you weren’t there with us in the Berkon Beacons?” 

“Owen left the keys in the car.” 

“John Hart.” 

“At least partially your fault for being late.” 

“You literally just broke into it. How can it be break proof if you just picked the lock?” 

Ianto couldn’t help it. He laughed. The argument was so dumb. Gwen laughed too. It was the kind of stupid, meaningless back and forth the they both needed. 

Ianto ran a hand over the dash. “Let’s leave it for Martha to ‘find’. That way she can stay in UNIT’s good graces a bit longer if we need that connection again. Tell her where it is and she’s the hero that found the lead; maybe they’ll focus on that instead of who even authorized her to be there in the first place. We can plant it the opposite direction of where we head. And then when this is all over we get this stupid car back.”

“Still the stupid car you lost,” said Gwen with a teasing smile. 

“What happened to you can’t tease me about this, I haven’t done that bit?”

“Yeah, yeah shut your face. Come on, we’ve got a car to ditch and a plane to catch.” 

They knew they wouldn’t have been able to take the guns with them through the security checkpoint, so they chose to leave them in Gwen’s car, which was the vehicle that got them to the airport parking lot. The only thing they brought with them was their mobiles, a laptop, the smallest energy scanner on their persons, the note, their com links and the box. 

They tapped in and gave Mickey and Martha the update. By the time they were through security, Martha would have “found” the SUV.   


* * *

“Eventually I need to change clothes,” grumbled Ianto as he sat down in seat 12B. “No time now, but I’m not exactly dressed to attend a wedding.” 

“You're in dress trousers at least,” said Gwen “don’t suppose this is the kind of event where I can just show up in my leather jacket, is it?”

“I was hoping for more of a quick pop in. Not much beyond ‘hi, congratulations, mind telling us more about your not-so-imaginary friend’s whereabouts and why your name was on this note inside of a secure, multinational, secret military complex?’” 

“Very smooth. Very to the point. Won’t send the poor bride running at all,” said Gwen. Her wryly smile betrayed her (lack) of sincerity on the subject. 

Far too quickly they touched down, dashed out of the airport, and found themselves hailing a cab to a particular quaint Scottish village. 

Moment of truth, thought Ianto. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize for how late this update is. I kept putting off fact checking something regarding the SUV discussion, got distracted by Halloween fest, and then I decided to tweak some plot details that come after this bit, meaning I had to do some rewriting. Anyways here it is:)


End file.
